


Right Out of My Mouth

by SurelyForth



Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout 4
Genre: F/M, Friendship, Romantic Friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-09
Updated: 2016-02-09
Packaged: 2018-05-19 10:36:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,141
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5964213
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SurelyForth/pseuds/SurelyForth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They have code names on top of code names, secret handshakes and ten ways to signal "feral incoming", but Deacon and Fixer still haven't settled on what they might be, exactly. Inconsequential one shot, main storyline spoilers.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Right Out of My Mouth

Deacon was readying lines while the wind cleared the air below them of superfluous smoke and debris, leaving behind a single black column at the core of the CIT ruins. Desdemona and the Railroad’s team of heavies were gone, already focused on their next set of responsibilities and Dez probably handing out assignments on the elevator ride to ground. It was her relentless adherence to being _in charge_ that was most responsible for his prolonged silence in the aftermath of…well, everything.

 _Everything_ being so inadequate a word to cover the events of the past few days, but he’d just finished doing a whole hell of a lot, so _everything_ would have to suffice.

He had lines, but he knew that Fixer wasn’t in a place to benefit from them. _Yet_. She’d managed to play the emotional heavy with Desdemona, hedging a bit on the rushing straight to work idea, but promising to be by HQ within the next couple of days for a more informed debriefing and a new mission.

But when it was just him? She let the façade slip as if she were alone. It was possible that she thought she _was_ \- she’d returned to the edge of the Mass Fusion roof before the others had cleared out, she may have expected Deacon to join them.

Although it didn’t feel great to consider, it was possible she _wanted_ him to. He’d not been certain how to take the admission that she believed this had been _his_ plan all along. After months of pinballing around the Commonwealth under the directives of those she’d taken to calling Men With Agendas, Maxson and Father the two faces conjured when she said it, it was just as likely to be a condemnation as it was a compliment. _But I called you boss_ , _boss,_ he imagined himself deflecting in a direct confrontation, _that’s got to count for something, right?_

He doubted it would come to that. She was grieving now, arms wrapped tightly around herself as if the heavy leather coat she wore like a prize wasn’t already too much on a night as warm as this one. He worked his way in silence, arcing around her so he’d first appear safely distant in her peripheral view, and waited for her to signal what she needed him to be.

He had his distractions ready to go, but they were seeming less adequate the longer she stared at the pit that had been the Institute, tears running unimpeded down her cheeks. _He_ was feeling less adequate the longer he watched her and did nothing, especially since he had felt this coming _months_ ago, when she went underground that first time with a hopeful smile and the goofiest of waves in his direction only to return wreathed in sadness and a palpable resignation that everything was fucked and she would have to cater to warring ideologies if it were to ever get _unfucked_.

 _But you did it,_ he very nearly shouted. He understood her anguish, oh _God_ did he understand. Surviving was sometimes as hard as being left for dead. He understood, but he wanted her to see what he saw beyond the billowing smoke. There was a world of purposeful struggle, of progress and hope. Like living past the ones you loved, it would be hard. But it would _be_ , it would be. 

Several feet away, Fixer was unfolding herself, hands wiping at tears and snot and a desperate and deep breath summoning him back to do what he did best.

“Hey, boss,” his voice was light but it didn’t come out as smoothly as he’d hoped. Something was constricting his throat, perhaps the magnitude finally landing or perhaps it was her cliché of a tearstained face, wasteland face paint smeared five different directions and faintly illuminated by the ghostliest of smiles, for him. “So…we did _that_.”

And it wasn’t a joke, although it could be. And it wasn’t what he thought she wanted to hear, with her son dead and the stench of smoke hanging in the air. It was no-frills truth dressed up with a hint of genuine disbelief.

 _Goddamn_ but he could hardly believe it.

“Yeah,” she agreed with a sniff, glancing back at the crater. Her voice was raspy and low and urging him closer. “A few days ago I was convinced it would never end- that I’d be stuck in one hell or another. With the Brotherhood, with the Institute. Just lying and _lying_ and trying not to think of what might happen if I fucked up. And now it’s…it’s _done_? Just like that, it seems,” she folded her hands against her stomach. “I have no idea how I’m supposed to feel about it.”

Her attention returned to him as he stopped beside her, close but not quite touching.

“Feel good,” he responded too emphatically, internal relief diffusing unchecked and words he’d been rehearsing for months coming out in a rush. “The Institute can’t take anything else from you or the Commonwealth, and they sure as hell can’t make more synths to enslave. Hold onto that, Fix. It might not seem like a lot right now, but a week or a month? Yeah, you’ll feel it. No Institute, synths saved, and look at us here, both alive,” he couldn’t help but smile through that. “The most important outcome, by the way. One man teams are _so_ 2286.”

She laughed and looked down at her lucky boots, held together by duct tape and sheer force of will. A gust of wind lifted the fleece-lined lapel of her coat so that it brushed against her cheek. Even this close it was hard to tell if the tears had stopped entirely.  

“I can only imagine what Desdemona has in store for us,” the thickness of her voice indicated a still immediate sadness. “What do _you_ think we should do next?”   

A good question, and one he’d posed to himself about a thousand times before tonight, working within various frameworks of co-workers (easy) and friends (a mystery) _._ Most pressing was figuring out the limits of partnership in an organization as small as the Railroad. He’d never tested them this thoroughly, and with Glory gone…well, someone was bound to point out the inefficiency, if not make outright accusations

He’d have to spend the next couple of days figuring out a way to defuse _those_ arguments without seeming too defensive of their little operation of two.

But that hardly mattered now.

“I think we should start our own band,” he held his hands out to frame his next words against the clear sky east of the CIT ruins. “Saviors of the Commonwealth.” _Nice_. He tilted his head, one eyebrow lifting slightly as he made a pleased noise in his throat. “ _Hmm_. I always wanted groupies.”

This earns a snort and a real grin, and he can see her getting into the rhythm of their usual back and forth.

“I can see it, yeah,” she sniffed again and nudged his arm with her elbow. “I’d keep your groupies away from Hancock, were I you.”

That would be a real concern in this fake scenario of theirs.

“Hancock’s easier to pick out of a line up, I’ll give him that,” Deacon relented. “But it’s all good- something tells me groupies are one of those things better in theory.” He paused for a moment, a cavalcade of life’s disappointments passing by before he settled into one of the few things that had yet to. He slung his arm around her shoulders and steered her deliberately away from the CIT. “Besides, what groupie could hold a candle to my best bandmate and pal?”

It was obvious bait, and he was almost as relieved when she slipped her arm around his waist as he had been to see the destructive cloud of light and smoke billowing above the Institute.

“Oh, outrageous flattery. I’m pretty sure that’s what got me into this mess to begin with,” she made a meager attempt at impersonating him. “She totally ripped a _yao guai_ in half with her bare hands, Dez, and then shotgun smashed, like, _five_ synths in the face before they even knew she was there!”

For a meager attempt, it was still pretty good.

“I stand by it,” he reeled her in as close as he dared. “And I’ve got more, if you’re interested.”

This time her laughter echoed across the roof, and he recognized it as the swing of someone so exhausted that nuanced emotions weren’t easy, or feasible, to maintain. It begged for a big one, a compliment so grandiose that they’d be joking about it for years. He had what seemed like a hundred in a mental cache labeled _Fixer_ , alongside his jokes, some specific half-truths, a few things he’d never be able to properly express without a blank canvas, and one or two he could manage quite well right now-

She pressed against his side and slipped her hand under the hem of his jacket to hook her fingers through the single intact belt loop on the old jeans he’d worn against her nervous protests that he’d have his legs shot clean off and something about “office casual”. Her head dropped so that it was resting on his shoulder.

“I’m always interested, kiddo,” her voice was low beneath a roar of wind or maybe the thunderous pulsing of blood in his ears.

-and it was a deep breath to get through that, and another to remind himself where they were, and who.

“Ooh. The pressure’s on,” he paused for a beat, discarding all the blithely witty and mostly insincere lines he could feed her as they walked to the elevator. It was hard to focus- they were both warm and where they met was a blaze. “Some dusty old philosopher thought people were made of metals that defined their character,” it sounded okay so far, light but earnest and true _for him_. He braced himself. “And you, my friend, are solid gold.”

They were at the elevator now, the glass door whooshing to welcome them. Deacon didn’t know what he wanted to think of less- how much space was between their feet and the ground, or the actual weight of what he said versus what she would measure.

“I thought you weren’t one for hugs,” she lifted her head, and he could see her assessing him at the edge of his vision. “This is kind of a hug.”

They took the last step onto the elevator the way they always did- side by side with a comically exaggerated and synchronized step over the threshold, as if it were a thing that could swallow one of them but not the two of them combined.

“The Institute’s gone,” he reminded as if she could ever forget it. “It’s a brave new world, pal, and I’m _all_ about changing. I mean, you’ve met me, right?”

He expected another laugh when they began their slow descent. Instead he felt her pull away, but not _too_ far. With practiced care she touched the bottom edge of his sunglasses and pushed them up, just enough that his eyes were exposed in the erratic light that filled the elevator as it slipped past floors left untouched for centuries and those more recently occupied.

“ _Deacon_. Plato? Really?” She smiled and it was affectionate and a bit north of affection and her face paint was smeared and punctuated by smudgy tear tracks and the faint lines that bracketed her mouth. None of it mattered more than the way she held his gaze and he let her, no matter how fucking vulnerable it made him feel every time it happened. “You really are the most,” she shook her head and her expression became a hypothesis he’d been testing for months. “Same, kiddo. Just… _whatever_ it is, same.”

And she had never been one for outrageous flattery or having to shout to be heard, _really_ heard, over a cacophony of her own making. So _same_ might not sound like much, but it was kind of everything.

 _Everything_ …still inadequate considering what had happened this week, this year, this _lifetime_ …and right here, in a 200 year-old elevator as it shimmied and shuddered its way to ground.  

“Good,” he replied, and repeated silently when his sunglasses fell back onto his nose and she was beside him again, one hand searching her satchel for a couple of loose cigarettes to enjoy before they hit the mean streets of Boston and the other hanging free beside his own to take. So he did, palm a bit embarrassingly damp but his grasp confident, and even more so when the smokes were distributed and her head returned to his shoulder. “There’s plenty of ass left to kick, and it’s a hell of a lot more fun doing it with a friend.”

 

 

 

 

 


End file.
